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The Pitt Grad Who Pioneered TV

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Pitt graduate Vladimir Zworykin is often called “the father of television." His research also led to the development of the electron microscope and night-seeing infrared devices.

While historians tend to agree that the development of TV was too complex and
drawn-out to be the work of a single inventor, the Russian-born Zworykin (1889-1982)
was undoubtedly a key TV pioneer. After earning his PhD in physics at
Pitt in 1926, he did experiments—first at Pittsburgh’s Westinghouse Corp., then
for Radio Corporation of America (RCA) in Camden, N.J.—that culminated in
patents for the TV camera tube, the kinescope television receiver, and the
first color TV system. His inventions led to the universal adoption of
electronic over mechanical TV, in which synchronized moving parts had generated
rudimentary pictures.

In later years, Zworykin maintained a
parental interest in television, though he was a disappointed papa. Believing
in TV’s profound educational and humanitarian potential, Zworykin despised the
soap operas, sitcoms, and cop shows that continue to keep viewers glued to some
1.5 billion sets worldwide.

“I hate what they’ve done to my child,”
he once said. “I would never let my own children watch it.” Asked to identify
his favorite part of a television set, Zworykin replied: “The switch to turn
the damn thing off.”